," says Hume, "the two parties, actuated by mutual rage, but
cooped up within the narrow limits of the law, levelled with
poisoned daggers the most deadly blows against each other's breast,
and buried in their factious divisions all regard to truth, honour,
and humanity."--

20. In the Dramatis Personae to Shadwell's play of Epsom-Wells, we have
Rains, Bevil, Woodly, described as "men of wit and pleasure."

21. Dryden had already distinguished Shadwell and Settle by those
names, which were destined to consign the poor wights to a painful
immortality, in the second part of Absalom and Achitophel,
published in 1682.

22. See note on p. 222. Vol. VI. describing this famous procession.

23. This passage, in Hunt's defence of the charter, obviously alludes
to the Duke of York, whom he elsewhere treats with little ceremony,
and to the king, whose affection for his brother was not without a
mixture of fear, inspired by his more stubborn and resolved temper.

24. William Viscount Stafford, the last who suffered for the Popish
plot, was tried and executed in 1680. It appears, that his life was
foully sworn away by Dugdale and Turberville. The manly and patient
deportment of the noble sufferer went far to remove the woful
delusion which then pervaded the people. It would seem that Hunt
had acted as his solicitor.

25. A quip at his corpulent adversary Shadwell.

26. The infamous Titus Oates pretended, amongst other more abominable
falsehoods, to have taken a doctor's degree at Salamanca. In 1679,
there was an attempt to bring him to trial for unnatural practices,
but the grand jury threw out the bill. These were frequent subjects
of reproach among the tory authors. In the Luttrel Collection,
there is "An Address from Salamanca to her unknown offspring Dr
T.O. concerning the present state of affairs in England." Also a
coarse ballad, entitled, "The Venison Doctor, with his brace of
Alderman Stags;"

Showing how a Doctor had defiled
Two aldermen, and got them both with child,
Who longed for venison, but were beguiled.

27. Our author has elsewhere expressed, in the same terms, his
contempt for the satire of "The Rehearsal." "I answered not the
Rehearsal, because I knew the author sat to himself when he drew
the picture, and was the very Bayes of his own farce." _Dedication
to Juvenal._--The same idea occurs in a copy of ver